The peloton – up close and personal

Reporter John Henderson is covering the Tour de France for The Denver Post …

Toulouse, France – Sorry if this blog has typos. My hands are still trembling from nearly wiping out the entire peloton Friday.

I had nothing to do with it. The culprit was one Matt White, the driver of Team Garmin-Chipotle’s lead car. I earned the gift of riding in the passenger’s seat. Actually, no one seemed terribly worried. Apparently, in his first year on the job, White has developed a reputation as one of the best drivers in the Tour.

I didn’t know if I was more impressed with White or the cyclists after seeing them up close and personal. As we drove along with the peloton, I could see their sweat, hear their cries and thought I’d get winged by their flying water bottles.

Despite a drug culture right out of rural Colombia and a belief that cyclists have to be the world’s dumbest athletes to test the world’s toughest anti-doping police, I’ve always respected their physical abilities. I never thought I could respect a man who can ride a bike around France more than I did but I do now.
These guys don’t glide through these stages. They are pumping with unbelievable horsepower from the very start. Friday’s stage was 95 miles nearly all uphill and they raced like the police were chasing them.

Meanwhile, I was terrified White’s wild scrambling through and around the peloton would put a few cyclists, some fans or me in the hospital.

“I’ll make a prediction,” team chiropractor Kevin Grove told me that morning. “Five or six times you will pretend to slam on the brakes.”

He was wrong. I counted 12.

But it’s the only way to see a bike race. Standing along the side is too fleeting. Watching on TV doesn’t capture the steepness of mountains or all the effort in the riders. Then again, my knuckles never turned white sitting on a couch.